Another outgrowth of that young cadre (composed mostly of recent-ish U of T music grads) that has been making lots of great music in the local creative music scenes lately. This particular unit features Emily Denison (trumpet), Anthony Argatoff (alto saxophone), Victor Vrankulj (double bass), and Andrew Miller (drums), each kicking in some of their own compositions and tackling a couple standards. A run through Ornette Coleman's "Latin Genetics" captured their penchant for galloping playfulness that really shines on their recent HAVN-released album. They were competing with a raucous tribute band belting out the tunes of Janis Joplin in the Main Hall (a show that had been rescued from the shuttered Hugh's Room), but the quartet managed to crank things up into some tasty zones. Riffing off each other both in music and conversation, they were at their best when that playful element was at the forefront and they let the tunes breathe and wobble a bit.

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Founded as a blog about one curmudgeon's love affair with the em dash, Mechanical Forest Sound has grown to become a community-based archive of local musical culture. Assuming that "independent music" isn't just boys with guitars and "culture" isn't just some sort of pageant, MFS is an investigation of a wide range of artists, reflecting on concerts as shared experiences, acts of citizenship and a chance to get down — fuzzy photographs and clear-sounding original live recordings a specialty.

Current manifestations of this project include Track Could Bend, a monthly concert series featuring "improvised music and weird rock offshoots", presented in a casual environment.

At one point I wrote full-on concert reviews, and for longer I thought I would catch up and write about shows in the past. But these days, because of, y'know, life, do not expect much in the way of full show reviews — but live recordings with blurbs will be posted as quickly after the fact as is feasible.

All MP3's on this blog are audience recordings shared as a reminder of the excitement of seeing live music. If you are an artist who doesn't want their music shared in this way, please contact me and I shall remove it forthwith.